Ratings

Here is a brief introduction to wine ratings as well as my system for scoring wines.

First thing is first - I only review wines, restaurants, recipes, books, movies, etc that I like. It’s a waste of my time to write about things I didn’t like, and a waste of your time to read about stuff that wasn’t great. That being said, if something stands out as being awful or having terrible value, I may mention to avoid it! But for the most part, I only put wines on this site that I rate above 85 points (I taste a lot more wine than I actually write about).

Usually we see wines scored out of a scale of 0-100, 100 of course being outstanding. The actual breakdown of how a wine scores in individual category varies, but include qualities such as aroma, mouth, finish and overall quality. Generally, you will not see a wine lower than 50 - these are considered F’s (on a typical A-F grading system, where A would be the equivalent to a 90, and A+ would denote an outstanding (100 pt) wine. Robert Parker, for instance, starts all wines at 50 points.

A few things to think about when considering a the score a particular wine may have received:

1. Who rated the wine? Commonly, we see: WS (Wine Spectator), WA (Wine Advocate), RP (Robert Parker), etc. The source of the wine rating is very important. It is advisable that you figure out which source has tastes most similar to yours if you are going to use them to evaluate wines for your own consumption!

2. How and when was the wine tasted? Was it done “blind” or a part of an open evaluation? If the tasting is open it may be biased in the favor of more popular, or trendy wines.Was it tasted from the barrell, immediately following release, or some time during it’s aging on the shelf?

3. How many bottles of the wine were tasted? Wines can vary a good bit bottle to bottle. Maybe one bottle is a little corked or was exposed to harsh elements? It’s important to try a wine more than once before concluding it was very bad!

My Wine Ratings

When I first started the site I did not intend to use numerical or any other type of rating to describe a wine. I felt that wine ratings are very subjective and often not very informative. I’ve since changed my mind, but only because I came to the conclusion that ratings can be helpful if the person reading them has some background on the reviewers personal tastes and rating system.

So, here’s a little background on my tastes and how I rate the wines!

I have been drinking wines with some sort of passion and seriousness for around 6 years. I have worked as a wine sales representative and in that time had a chance to taste a lot of wine and form a pretty good understanding of many wines of the world. I am not at all in any way affiliated with any wine producer, importer, distributor, or retail shop.

I initially began drinking mostly California wines, starting with Cabernet and then Pinot. I spent two years focusing on French wines and have learned quite a bit in that time. I also have extensive knowledge and experience with Portuguese wines (not just port, but all varietals). My most recent “favorite” wine is anything from Italy, Spain, Languedoc, Austria, as well as California Syrah, Merlot and Pinot.

The number one quality I look for in any wine is integration. Regardless of all the individual components, if the wine comes together nicely it’s a good chance I’ll love it!

One area where I lack sufficient experience to properly evaluate quality of the wines is with mature Bordeaux. I haven’t been fortunate enough to have many 30+ year old Bordeaux’s (if anyone is willing to share, I’d be happy to join you!), with the better wines, when these begin showing well.

Finally, with my ratings I’ve decided to add whether or not the wine is a good buy based on the following system:

• OV - Outstanding value, purchase as much as you can!
  
• VGV- Very good value, splurge a bit and buy two bottles
• GV - Good value - worth buying a bottle
  
• OK - OK value - buy it if you really like the variety, producer, or can’t find anything else on the list
• PV - Poor value - maybe a good wine, maybe a bad wine, either way, not worth the money.
• DNB - Do Not Buy! Pretty self explanatory. Reserved for bad wines at bad prices.
• CV - Classic Value - The wine has a very high price, but it’s a collectors item and worth it if you can afford it.

Keep in mind with value ratings, it’s relative to the wine. For instance, I may give an 89 point Merlot an OKV if it’s $50. But, I may give a $40 Merlot 90 pts and a GV. It’s relative to how I feel the wine performs both within its price point and within its rating. Perhaps the former wine is good, but in only one or two dimensional whereas the latter is a well rounded effort with good regional character. The point is, the rating system is in place so you know whether I feel the wine is worth it based on price, style, availability and quality.

NOTE: The “Value System” was created by Michael Mohammadi on December 3, 2007. Use of this system is subject to approval by Michael Mohammadi and is currently being registered as a Trademark of Michael Mohammadi.